1. American Romanticism
1800 – 1860

2. A New Vision for a New Nation
Industrialism causes explosive growth in cities, leading to overpopulation, illness, crime, corruption
Rationalist worldview of Revolutionary Period seen as dry, cold
The countryside serves as an ESCAPE from the harshness of city
Search for the spiritual - God - in NATURE
Valued feeling and INTUITION over logic and reason

3. Progression of Thought in Developing America
Colonial
-religious
-strict
-conformity
Revolutionary
-reason
-morality
-independence
Romantic
-nature
-escape
-imagination

4. The Five I’s of Romanticism
Inspiration
Nature as divine inspiration – Finding God in Nature
Idealism
The world only truly exists in your mind – IDEAS vs. reality –you create reality
Imagination
Respect for the creative and original thought – NON-conformity
Intuition
Value FEELING and emotion over logic and reason
Individuality
Power and potential of the individual – self-reliance

5. Two Brands of Romanticism: Transcendental and Gothic (aka Anti-Transcendental)
Nature is healing
Optimistic
Positive potential of the mind
Self-reliance
Reflective Essays
Poetry
Gothic
Nature can be destructive
Melancholy
Darkness of the mind
Guilt, frustration
Fiction Novels
Fiction Short Stories

6. A Dream Within a Dream, by Edgar Allan Poe
I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep - while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?
Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.

7. A Dream Within a Dream, by Edgar Allan Poe
Using Poe’s “A Dream Within a Dream,” think about and discuss the following with a group of your peers:
Is this an example of Romanticism? Why or why not?
If it is an example of Romanticism, which brand does it fall under – transcendental or gothic? Why?
Is this a typical Poe poem based on your prior knowledge of Edgar Allan Poe writing? Why or why not?
Look carefully at the poem. Point out any poetry techniques that you notice (i.e. types of rhyme, rhyme scheme, figures of speech, etc)